Update on implementation of WPA Action Plan 2020‐2023
Authors: Afzal Javed
Journal: World Psychiatry (2023)

Despite the ongoing impacts of the COV­ID-19 pandemic and the difficulties in getting connected1, 2, the WPA has remained active in its professional work and in meet­ing its objectives during the last two years. As the situation is getting a bit better now, our work to implement the current tri­enni­um Action Plan also gets a noticeable momentum3. The WPA Executive Com­mittee and its different components as well as the Secretariat staff are committed to fulfill their responsibilities4-8. The WPA has strengthened its virtual work and e-learning programmes among colleagues and trainees around the world, which has led to offering more online educational activities. Our educational portal is providing an excellent educational resource to our membership, and we were delighted to produce several educational modules, courses, teaching sessions and online training programmes8. The enhanced and quicker development of the WPA education learning management system has also promoted the devel­opment of new education and training mod­ules. Like many other professional organi­za­tions, the WPA has encouraged and sup­port­ed its membership to use e-mental health tools and e-learning techniques. The por­tal also gives ready access to WPA's existing train­ing materials available in several languag­es. The available programmes on our edu­ca­tional portal and learning management system include new modules such as those on comorbidities of mental disorders, mood dis­orders and dementias. Recently held cours­es have attracted a lot of contacts, es­pecial­ly those on ICD-11, tele-​psychiatry and yoga. Similarly, webinars on early in­ter­ven­tion in psychosis, updates in psycho­phar­ma­col­o­gy, psychotherapy, and child and ad­olescent psychiatry have attracted many par­ticipants. Various programmes outlined in the Ac­tion Plan 2020-2023 are also ongoing. Work­ing Groups are implementing several initiatives in areas of training and research, and clinical updates. Activities by the Working Groups on Managing Comorbidity of Mental and Physical Health, Early Intervention in Psy­chosis, Public Mental Health, and Pro­motion of Psychiatry Among Medical Stu­dents are drawing additional attention to the cur­rent needs and opportunities in these areas of work9-11. The support of the WPA Scientific Sections is playing a vital role in our activities. In a highly stimulating way, the Sections' work is providing a great motivation to young psy­chiatrists to benefit from experts' contri­bu­tions. Similarly, WPA's network of Col­lab­orating Centres12 has been involved in various scientific initiatives, including joint educational seminars and support to young psy­chiatrists in research and other related activ­ities. The WPA Collaborating Centre Group and the WPA Working Group on Medical Students offered medical students and psychiatric trainees the opportunity to obtain travel fellowships to attend the 22nd World Congress of Psychiatry in Bangkok. Psychiatric trainees were invited to submit an essay on the topic of "Forced displacement and mental health: challenges and resilience", while medical students were invited to submit an essay on "Breaking the silence: how is stigma a barrier to mental health?". Over 40 submissions were received from 15 countries from the trainees, and over 150 entries were submitted by the medical students from 39 different countries. The quality of entries was outstanding, and the judges were pleased to review and assess so many good essays from around the world, which is an encouraging reflection of the talent amongst future psychiatrists. Unfortunately, in addition to the COVID-19 pandemic, several other adversities affected us in many parts of the world during this triennium. The WPA established an Advisory Committee for Responses to Emergencies (ACRE), that brought together the leaders of the larger Member Societies to facilitate practical and concrete support to Member Societies in need. This work continued mobilizing and fostering collaboration, information collection, and development of local, national and international strategies to cope with the mental health consequences of emergencies throughout 2021 and 2022. In response to the war, and due to the grave concerns about the well-being of the Ukrainian people, particularly psychiat­ric patients and psychiatric staff, the ACRE planned and initiated its support to Ukraine. Reflecting our long-standing opposition to non-defensive military activities and mind­ful of the recent statements of various health and welfare organizations, as well as the vote of the United Nations Gen­eral Assembly con­demning the invasion of Ukraine, the WPA also expressed grave concern at reports of attacks on civilian facilities such as private residences, schools and hospitals, and of civilian casualties, including children, women, older per­sons, and persons with disabil­ities. The WPA also established an educational trauma resource centre on its website for mental health professionals, in Ukrainian, Russian and other languages, to help with the mental health challenges that people from Ukraine are currently facing. Support from our Member Societies and other com­po­nents was very encouraging13. Looking at Afghanistan's deteriorating conditions, that are not only causing a humanitarian crisis, but also adding concerns about provisions and delivery of health care for the general population, the WPA, as a part of its ACRE project, worked with its fellow Afghan mental health professionals to offer ongoing support through the provision of medicines, patient assessments and training. Similarly, the WPA offered support for buying psychotropic medicines to Sri Lanka, as the country was going through the worst economic crisis that it has faced in its history. With the start of the WPA eNewsletter in 2021, we are facilitating sharing of activi­ties and reports from our membership. The Newsletter has emerged as a strong me­di­um for our visibility on the social media platform and a better communication among different components of the Asso­ciation14. World Psychiatry, the WPA official journal, has achieved the unprecedented impact factor of 79.683 and continues ranking as the number one in the list of psychiatric journals and in the Social Sciences Citation Index. The journal is published regularly in three languages (English, Spanish and Rus­sian), with individual issues or articles also available on the WPA website in other languages (Chinese, French, Arabic, Turkish, Japanese, Romanian and Polish). More than 60,000 mental health professionals re­g­ularly receive the electronic or the print ver­sion of the journal. All the back issues can be freely downloaded from the PubMed system and the WPA website. We very much enjoyed our successful hy­brid World Congress of Psychiatry that took place in Bangkok in August 2022. While adapt­ing and innovating new resources, we were able to redesign the scientific programme and ensured coverage of the most timely clinical, academic and research topics to our membership15. I am also pleased that we are actively working for our next World Congress to be held in Vienna, Austria from September 28 to October 1, 2023. As we kick off for the last year of this tri­ennium, we are positive that the challenges that will undoubtedly come, as the long-term impact on mental health following this pandemic becomes more evident, will be addressed effectively. We are enthusiastic and learning fast with the changes and look forward with confidence to the future, remaining fully committed and confident to fulfilling our triennium's goals, and to continuing with our efforts to build up the future of psychiatry and mental health together.